TitsnChicks said:
I registered just to reply to this post.
I was also stood at club/vale on the grass and wondered what lenses would get me close?
Would you be so kind as to share your camera settings for each shot, the lenses used, and what you believe would be the best lenses for capturing cars and other motor sports.
Hi, happy to suggest a few things....
I was at the F1 and am currently looking at buying a 7D MkII If it's announced in sept (70D if not) particularly for motor sports.
While its just speculative at the moment I'd wager this body would be ideal for motorsport. Many people use the current model (7D) for just that purpose. However, I too used to own one and found its ISO performance & overall image quality bordered on horrific and had numerous problems with inaccurate focusing even after multiple visits to service centers. While a crop body does offer you extended reach, the huge jump in IQ from FF far outweighed that advantage in my personal experience. I'd make sure the new 7D is a significant improvement over its predecessor in terms of both IQ and noise management before jumping at what is sure to be a very high price point. I used to use a 40D prior to my current gear and it was perfect so I dont see why the 70D shouldn't function well... just don't expect the same level of quality as the top flight stuff
I was also stood at club/vale on the grass and wondered what lenses would get me close?
Would you be so kind as to share your camera settings for each shot, the lenses used, and what you believe would be the best lenses for capturing cars and other motor sports.
If you shoot from stands you will get some very dull angles, these were taken with the 400mm f5.6 and 1.4x teleconverter on a 5d iii at entry to Luffield and exit of club corner (through the fence). This gave the effective focal length of 560mm.... the grassy bank in front of the Vale stand is somewhere I've never tried to shoot as its generally too difficult to pick the cars up early enough to track them reliably, if you wanted to anyway you'd need to get right up to the fence and I'd imagine 300mm would probably be too much
I was thinking the 100-400 II (if announced) if not the current version is easy to get hold of. Will this have enough reach? Is it fast enough? Will it fill the frame at 400mm from the grandstand opposite the international pit straight for example.
400mm will give you an effective focal length of 640mm on a crop body (assuming the 7D ii follows suit), this will likely be over kill from the international straight but as its a zoom lens it will be more than capable from this spot. As for filling the frame elsewhere that is very much dependent on where you stand but its probably fine for 75% of angles. The old version of the 100-400 is popular among motorsport shooters, just bear in mind prime lenses always provide better image quality (not by much, but be aware). As for is it fast enough...yes and no, its all dependent on what you want to do....my images were all limited to f8 due to the TC and you can judge if they are acceptable to you. Obviously the faster your lens the more flexible it is, but both the 100-400 and 400 f5.6 are about £1000 (with the new version expected to be significantly more) if you can burn 4 times that for the f4 (or 8x for the 2.8) then fair enough but you might as well consider 500s and 600s if you have that sort of cash.... Sigma lenses have been good to me in the past with the 100-300 f4, also fancied the 500 f4.5, their pro lenses are good performers and significantly cheaper than canon equivalents
If stood at the top of club/vale where you come in (not down by the fence) what lenses will allow me to fill the frame with a car at such a distance?
If you are talking about the low fence between the disabled grandstand and the covered club grandstand at the top of the bank a crop body and the 400 will be fine for near and mid chicane, to fill it with them turning into the chicane you would probably need a 500 or 600. If you are talking about the top of the grassy area next to vale stand, no amount of focal length will give you a really decent angle there, you will be wasting your money if you want to shoot from there, there are significantly better places to shoot from that wont have metal posts and lines encroaching into them
Circuit knowledge is 10x more useful than a giant lens.... and shooting through the fence (like i did with all mine in the original post) is generally better than trying to force a shot
If you have the opportunity zoom with your feet, wielding a telescope isn't really practical if you dont have to. Focusing is difficult enough at reasonable focal lengths but if you are pushing it you will introduce other problems like haze, shutter speeds to counteract user movement blah blah... for the sake of argument id recommend you ask Miken what he used as he seems to have shot from about there, but if you want side on shots there are better places to do it
I'd be really interested in your opinion as this is exactly why I am buying/upgrading my equipment.
It depends what your end goals are... if you want to keep it as a hobby, you either have to be really passionate or completely mad to spend the sort of money we are talking about (and I say that as a completely mad person
). If you intend to be a professional then be prepared to check your delusions at the door... there are hundreds of thousands of people with the same plan and about 10 spots in nearly every series of motorsport.. of those hundreds of thousands of hobbyists, maybe 10% have any real ability, closing further to 1% who actually end up getting accredited access.
Longer is not necessarily better, some of my favorite images of F1 are taken with less than 200mm lenses from the speccy side with consumer gear. While throwing money at it will help images a little, there's much bigger benefits to be had from learning how to take a good photograph (not saying that you don't)... if you cant take a good photograph with your current gear, new gear wont make much of a difference. I'd seriously consider if an upgrade is actually worth it or if you'd be better served by practising (devils advocate, I have no idea what your shots are like... just bear it in mind).
For example (from my history archive, not implying these are good.. just an example of shots with significantly cheaper gear):
Canon Bridge Camera (<£200) (very new to photography at this point)
rosberg 1 by
Fireproof Creative, on Flickr
/\ From pit at test \/ from speccy areas at luffield
massa2 by
Fireproof Creative, on Flickr
Canon 40D + sigma 100-300 f4 (Combined total <£600) - all speccy areas (photographing for 4 years)
Sebastian Vettle by
Fireproof Creative, on Flickr
8 by
Fireproof Creative, on Flickr
Button by
Fireproof Creative, on Flickr
Canon 5D iii 400mm f5.6 and 70-200 f2.8 (>£5000) now into my 8th year since picking up a camera (and focusing on motorsport)
Daniil Kvyat by
Fireproof Creative, on Flickr
Fernando Alonso by
Fireproof Creative, on Flickr
Nico Rosberg by
Fireproof Creative, on Flickr
Absolutely Any info you can provide and share will be extremely appreciated and warmly welcomed, as I am buying all my equipment based on this exact scenario! And who better to give advice, than the guy who took these wonderful shots.
Thanks very much
Edit:
My username references birds that fly, I used to photo a lot of birds and found it amusing, but have just realised it may come across wrong, dam my sense of humour!
Disappointing